Book · 2011 · Computers
Electronic Value Exchange
Origins of the VISA Electronic Payment System
Why people recommend it
Electronic Value Exchange by David L. Stearns is widely considered the definitive historical text on the development and evolution of the Visa payment network. On the podcast Acquired, David Rosenthal opened a deep dive into the company by thanking David Stearns and praising his work as the absolute best book available on the subject. Rosenthal returned to the book multiple times throughout the episode to anchor his narrative. He utilized Stearns's insights to transition from the corporate and social aspects of the business into its dense technical history, noting the socio-technical dynamics at play. Furthermore, Rosenthal cited specific historical anecdotes from the book, such as details regarding deadline pressures, computer personnel assignments, and data center redundancy planning involving teams working on base systems. By weaving these detailed accounts into the podcast conversation, the host illustrated the immense operational challenges and engineering feats required to build the global infrastructure that powers modern credit card transactions every single day, reinforcing the book's reputation as an indispensable primary source for corporate and financial history enthusiasts.
Who recommended it
- David Rosenthal Recommended
David Rosenthal — 4 mentions
“well we are starting actually with a big thank you to Dave Sterns author of what is undeniably the very best book on Visa and its history electronic value exchange”
“as Dave puts it in electronic value exchange there's a socio technical aspect to this company and we've talked about the socio but not the technical”
“so Dave Sterns writes in his book about this whole situation”
“this is in Dave's book so one of the guys I think he was working on base one and then maybe got transferred into base 2”